


Come Back With A Story

by Chiomi



Series: Get Sharp [9]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Fae & Fairies, Gun Violence, Guns, Hale Family Feels, M/M, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Mythology - Freeform, POV Derek Hale, Slow Build, The Hale Pack - Freeform, Wild Hunt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-02
Updated: 2015-10-20
Packaged: 2018-04-12 12:24:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 10,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4479143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chiomi/pseuds/Chiomi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles smells like magic and gun oil and wolfsbane and ash, layered beneath and on top of the amphetamines-and-hormones-and-Stiles base smell, and it fucks with Derek’s instincts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. colored black by those killing machines

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Alexis for the quick beta!
> 
> We're going to, again, try for that thing I've heard of called an update schedule.

Stiles smells like magic and gun oil and wolfsbane and ash, layered beneath and on top of the amphetamines-and-hormones-and-Stiles base smell, and it fucks with Derek’s instincts. He smells like threat as well as pack, and it’s worse on Saturdays, and he doesn’t know why and doesn’t want to know why, he just wants Stiles to stop showing up at his apartment with pizza on nights when he smells like he’s going to kill them all. He scowls as he buzzes Stiles in, ignoring Boyd’s amused look.

There had been a time when he thought danger was exciting. Stiles smells like what made him change his mind and like a concentrated version of Deaton, Deaton who his mom introduced him to once when he was five and had a rabbit bone stuck in his throat and said, “If you ever meet someone who smells like Doctor Deaton without him or me or your dad or Uncle Peter there, get away as fast as you can. The thunderstorm smell means he has magic, and magic can hurt just as much as hunters.”

Derek can smell Stiles as soon as the elevator opens, and opens the door for him. He lets the betas get the door for each other: Stiles is the one exception in the pack, and it makes his skin crawl with shame, but he can’t stop. He does it in part because the lingering smell of wolfsbane means he needs to check, he needs to check every time, even if he’s trusted Stiles for months, now. The other part is that he’s an awful broken person too many years and betrayals older to even think what he thinks sometimes, when Stiles is snapping at him and wielding a kind of power Derek will never have and dealing with emergencies with snarky determination and having the strength of will to kill someone wearing his face.

Stiles is smirking when Derek opens the door, and thrusts an extra large meat lovers at his chest. “Have you guys figured out yet who’s going with Lydia to the equinox thing?”

Jackson rolls his eyes and says huffily, “You, nutsack.” Lydia hasn’t taken him back, which would be a concern if Jackson weren’t so firmly bound up in the pack link. If being single threatens to make him go kanima again, they can drag him home.

The smirk falls off his face, and Derek says, trying to be reassuring, “Both of us.”

“You expect it to be that bad?” Stiles hands Lydia the bag holding her salad, and he does not look at all reassured. Derek keeps his confidence that it’ll be fine as firm and present in the pack bond as he can - his own trepidations can stay under wraps, because confidence is going to be part of how they get through unscathed, and if Stiles starts panicking it’ll cascade.

“It should be fine,” Lydia says. “But it’s a show of strength and a reminder that they’re not actually the boss of me.”

“Family, man,” Stiles says, flopping down on the couch next to her. “Why’s it gotta be so complicated?”

Derek sits next to him, so his thigh’s a solid comfort next to his, and sets the pizza box on the table. Everyone dives into it.

“Well, we’ve got Spring Break before that, and that’s way more fun. We should all do something together,” Erica says.

Lydia raises both eyebrows at her incredulously. “That’s a week away. You don’t have any plans yet?”

“Excuse you, some of us used to spend our holidays _dying_.”

Their vicious banter has always reminded Derek of Laura and Cora.

“Well, I’m going to Hawai’i with Danny and Jackson,” Lydia says, tossing her hair back and stabbing her salad with a fork.

“We always go visit my grandparents,” Danny says with a shrug.

“Camping,” Scott suggests hopefully.

“Camping with laced alcohol?” Erica looks surprisingly intrigued, but Derek remembers the way sickness radiated from her body when he first met her, and wonders if she’s ever been camping before.

“If anyone whines about getting rained on, I’ll throw you off a cliff,” Derek says, grabbing the last piece of pizza. Stiles pats his thigh, seemingly approving, and the touch is weightier and more interesting than it should be. _Underage_ , he reminds himself, but then he inhales and Stiles’ scent hits him again. Very deliberately, he shoves his face full of pizza.


	2. the forest of talking trees

Danny, Jackson and Lydia fly out to Hawaii the Friday night that marks the start of Spring Break, and by the time Derek can feel Danny and Jackson’s presences flying away everyone who’s staying is getting organized at the apartment. Well, for a given value of organized. It still gets something like cold at night, but they’re mostly werewolves, and have different ideas of what preparedness looks like. Derek lets Stiles sort out allocating who has to carry what in which car - they listen to him, less resentfully than to Derek, and Derek’s become reluctantly and relievedly used to it.

Eventually, somehow, he ends up in the passenger seat of the Jeep, his backpack on his lap. Even if there’d been room in the back, he wouldn’t have given it up: he’s got a solar charger for his phone in his bag, and he’s going to hide it from the rest of the pack as long as possible. They don’t actually need to be playing Candy Crush while they’re camping, and they’ve told people where they’ll be, so it’s no skin off his nose if they’re not actually prepared.

They’re going camping in the Preserve, to the slight disapproval of everyone’s parents. It’s been awhile since anyone was killed there, but only Melissa and the Sheriff know they’d be able to handle themselves, and the two of them don’t want the kids looking for trouble. They’re both reassured, though that Derek’s Spring Break is the same time as the high school’s, out of some misguided idea that he’s actually able to keep them safe or out of trouble. They park out in one of the lots off the highway, because even though it’s the same Preserve it apparently only counts as camping if you’re more than a stone’s throw from someone’s backyard. Derek’s not questioning it, because he grew up camping - in the Preserve and in national parks where they were far enough from other people that they could run around shifted all day - and he’s more than willing to indulge Erica’s demands when this is the first time camping is even a possibility for her.

They’re only hiking a little ways into the woods, but everyone’s loaded down with supplies - tents and sleeping bags and massive grocery sacks of snack food. There’s probably alcohol, too, but Derek doesn’t have a problem with that. He’ll keep an eye on Stiles, and he’s not telling any of his betas how to get a buzz until it’s actually legal.

They get to a clearing big enough to hold them with a fire pit in the middle. Derek’s already started bracing himself for when they inevitably want s’mores - he knows Stiles won’t want the campfire permit to have been for nothing. Erica drops everything and claps her hands together. “Tent!”

Boyd huffs and sets down the bag with the tent in it. “Where do you want it?”

Erica looks around, trying to find somewhere perfect. There isn’t anywhere, really: there’s debris and sad grass and dirt, and then the trees all in the muted shades of drought. Derek points to where the tent won’t be downwind of the smoke. “There.”

Derek feels like he should probably show them how to do a bear cache, the way his parents taught him, but bears know the smell of wolf, and his parents had mostly taught them so they would know what to do if they were with humans.

He sets his stuff under a tree. “I’m going for a walk.”

“I’ll come with,” Stiles says, looking transparently terrified of getting roped in to setting up the tent.

Derek doesn’t mind, though - less than minds. They walk through the woods and everything is gilded in the setting sun, with Stiles’ eyes going from beta-bright to fathomless in the change from light to shade. He can hear when the swearing stops, and they start back.

Isaac’s gotten out most of the food out, and the tent’s all good to go. It’s more than big enough for the six of them. “Hey, what bag are the lanterns in?”

Stiles jumps in again, and it feels natural to let him deal with the details. It’s not really ceding to him, though, or doesn’t feel like it - Stiles still checks in before he lights the small campfire, and it hasn’t ever felt like he’s tried to reshape the pack bond other than adding new people. Which is - well, Danny’s been a good addition. It worked out.

The fire is - Derek’s not going to be happy about fire ever again, probably. But this is contained, and the s’mores Stiles hands him are good, and there’s a thick ring of stone keeping the pack from tragedy and devastation.

Derek ends up curling up right in front of the door of the tent anyway, so he’ll smell something through the screen and get them all out in time if he needs to. But he sleeps, and the ululating miserable wolf howl in the woods makes its way into his dreams.


	3. the son was an okay guy

They stay the weekend in the woods, but by Monday they’re almost out of junk food and Isaac keeps eyeing Derek like he’s considering challenging him for alpha in order to get his hands on the solar charger. Tuesday morning, Erica rolls over, basically plants her face in Boyd’s armpit, and hastily sits up. “I’ve totally gotten the full camping experience now and I’m over it. I want to go back to where I can actually use my hairdryer.”

Derek reaches out and ruffles her hair, much to her annoyance. He smirks at her and opens the tent, letting in more fresh air. They all spill out to take care of morning business and start desultorily packing up. When Erica gets back from the bathrooms, he touches her arm to stop her and asks her quietly, “It was good?”

She throws herself against him in one of the aggressive hugs she’s fond of, tucks her head under his chin. “You’re the best.”

He squeezes her shoulder, then pries her away from him. “Make sure to pick up all the trash.”

-

The rest of Spring Break seems to involve too many teenagers in his apartment at all times, which drives Derek to checking the progress on his building in person. He’s been leaving everything in the hands of the project manager and the LEED consultant, but there are some things that he needs to decide personally - and some he can take a really long time deciding on. He loves his pack, he does, and it’s satisfying in his bones to have a large pack again, but they’re loud and he’s still not reaccustomed to people in his space at all hours.

Somehow Stiles ends up catching him on the way out of the building on Thursday, and it’d be a surprise except for the part where he’s already got a deputy signed up to rent when the building’s ready to go. “Do you know how to use a gun?”

Derek looks down and pointedly shifts just his claws, tucked away in the shadow of his body. “No, Stiles.” He relaxes his claws back under his skin because the project manager is still in the building and might come out at any time.

“You’ll have to when you work for my dad.”

“I’ve got until next winter before I even start training, and then the whole training course,” Derek says. He kind of wishes the Sheriff hadn’t said anything to Stiles. Derek’s still the alpha, for all that he’s not quite sure what Stiles is. As alpha, he shouldn’t show weakness, shouldn’t show how very _much_ training he still needs to do anything.

Stiles rolls his eyes. “So you’re planning on learning how to shoot during the same 18 weeks you’re gonna have to learn how to fight hand to hand like a human as well as memorizing all of the procedure?”

Derek makes a face at him. He doesn’t like guns, hates the smell and the impersonal nature and the fallibility of bullets. It’s the biggest thing he’s dreading about becoming a deputy. The second is all the public interaction, the stuff he’s out of practice on and the way that they’ll look at him, the ones who remember, with suspicion or pity depending on what weighs heavier in their memory and gazes that will stick to him like mold. “Yes.”

Stiles rolls his eyes again, hard enough that his whole upper body moves. “Fine, loser. If you change your mind, though, my dad and I both practice at the range every Saturday.”

Which makes sense, and Derek doesn’t like that he didn’t put it together earlier. Of course Stiles does his own training beyond the research and magic stuff. Derek shifts his shoulders in a gesture too tight to be a shrug but hopefully still dismissive. Stiles gets back into his Jeep, and Derek should probably thank him - the words are there in his mouth but won’t come out before Stiles drives away. Derek has no idea why Stiles didn’t just text him about this, but he thinks it might be that Stiles has been in a wolf pack long enough that the physical aspects of communication are important enough not to miss. Derek feels complicated about that. Stiles is an integral part of the pack, and Derek can’t imagine it without him, but at the same time, humans are supposed to be - more human than wolf, and here Stiles is more wolf than boy, and Derek isn’t sure he had enough of a choice.

He thinks of the lives that would have been lost if the necromancer had lived, though, of the things Peter might have done, or Scott when he lost all control. Stiles would see his actions as necessary, given the alternatives, and might not have seen it as a choice. Derek couldn’t have stopped any of it on his own, probably wouldn’t have been able to protect his betas, and the idea of how badly he’d have failed on his own leaves an ashy taste in his mouth. He drives back to the apartment and makes a ridiculous quantity of lasagna to feed his pack. He has them, which is the important part, and unravelling gratitude and need from want is something that isn’t relevant for several months anyway. He has his pack, and he has the problem of the Fae court to deal with. 


	4. had a pet dragonfly

When Derek feels Danny and Jackson arrive back in town on Saturday, he makes a point to meet Lydia at her door. She’s not pack, so he’s not going to show up actually in her house, and if he waited any longer she might have met up with Allison, who he’d still rather avoid. “What’s the dress code for the party?”

Her mouth tightens. “My uncle texted me on the flight back, the useless jerk. White tie.”

Derek nods - he’s expected something like this. At least it’s a social trap rather than a bloody one, at this point. “I’m covered.” He takes out a credit card and hands it over. “Use this. Can you wrangle Stiles?”

Lydia’s smile at the credit card is terrifying. “Oh, yeah. He’s not going to know what hit him.”

Nodding, Derek backs away. If she were a wolf she’d have challenged him for alpha by now, and won. She’s more than capable of wrestling Stiles away from the plaid.

-

His betas start school again on Monday, and Derek ends up spending half the morning in his boxers on the couch watching HGTV because he damn well can. Then he’s got his own classes to get to, and they mean he doesn’t arrive back home until well after everyone else is done. Isaac’s the only one there, which means the rest of them have probably gone to the places they actually live to eat dinner and do homework. Derek makes pasta for dinner and he and Isaac eat at the table with their laptops so they can still work on homework. Or, well, play clicker games, in Isaac’s case.

The week is quiet, and the town feels like it’s putting more effort into being spring despite the lack of moisture. Derek usually likes spring, likes new growth, but not when the greenest tree in the forest is the magic oak growing from the corpse of his family home and everything else just feels like it’s waiting. It means his runs don’t settle him, just itch under his skin.

Thursday is almost welcome. Or, well, wholly welcome. Derek just wants the trap to spring so the anticipation isn’t tangible in every breath he takes.

Isaac’s the one who gets the door when Stiles and Lydia arrive, because Derek’s still going through the family photos he’d found in the vault trying to find whether he’s supposed to wear the damn pocket square with the triskelion or not. Turns out he is, so he’s not that far behind Isaac until he stops dead in his tracks at the sight of Stiles.

Stiles in full evening dress - a conservative cut, even, all black and with his waistcoat showing below the cut - is devastatingly attractive. The way he smells makes it worse, because he smells like petrichor and ozone, like the kind of battering vicious storm you don’t get in California. There’s want rising in his scent, too, and Derek reins himself in viciously. He might be a creature built from magic and the bones of the earth, but he’s not actually going to perish without rain, and Stiles only smells of it anyway. Derek shifts his attention, tries to focus with his eyes like a human instead of his nose like a wolf.

Lydia purses her lips at him, and he helplessly tries to drag his attention to her. “Good. I knew I wouldn’t have to supervise you, too.” She’s wearing a tiara in her upswept hair and a delicately sea-foam green dress with a skirt that gathers and drapes in waterfalls of silk, and she looks lovely. The fact that his only reaction is recognition of the fact is a sign that somewhere along the way he has lost all control of his life.

“We good to go?” he asks, voice as gruff as he can manage.

“Yes,” she says. “There’s a fairy ring in the park off Jefferson that’ll take us there and isn’t incredibly conspicuous when we get back.”

Derek nods and grabs his keys. “Isaac, don’t forget to work on that paper. If we’re not back by dawn - whatever. Later.”

“Are we walking or driving to the park,” he asks once they’re on the elevator. He’d gone out with Laura in New York, and even as an alpha werewolf she’d take a cab rather than walk more than two blocks in heels.

Lydia actually smiles at him, cautiously pleased. She’s been warming up some since she and Stiles - since Peter died again. Lydia tugs up her skirt a couple inches, revealing flats. “Walking.”

The park’s quiet at night, because it’s not the one where teenagers neck or anyone sells drugs. Like all the parks in town, it technically closes at sunset, but there’s no gate, so they just follow Lydia through it and then off the path to a thin ring of mushrooms. She concentrates, and a smell of fog and forest rises from her skin. The air shifts and twists and then moves in some subtly awful way that hurts Derek’s bones. He can see a party now, through a shimmer of not-quite-there.

They step through.


	5. the sky wasn't big enough for them all

Faerie feels frenzied, buzzing all along his skin. Derek takes an automatic step closer to Stiles and Lydia to watch their backs. There’s music playing from somewhere - Derek can’t tell where, and his whole sense of the space around him is thrown off. The crowd doesn’t help, all shapes and shades of almost-human.

Lydia sails forward, projecting unconcern, and Stiles and Derek move to flank her. Stiles is looking around just as restlessly as Derek is, none of the awe on his face that Derek might have expected him to show in the face of this. There’s opulence to spare draped over the tables and in the gold on the walls. There’s a throne, though, because of course there is, and they’re stopped a few feet short of it by a waifish woman with eyes to big and blue to be human. “The names of your companions, princess?”

“Derek Hale and Stiles Stilinski.”

The waifish woman’s voice carries like it shouldn’t, floating above the crowd. “Princess Lydia Martin of this court, accompanied by Derek Hale, alpha werewolf, and Stiles Stilinski, witch and second, both of the Hale pack.”

They move forward, and somewhere along the line they’ve learned to move as a unit. Another voice floats out, and Derek can’t locate the source, which is more than a little disconcerting. “Does she claim to be rigfénnid now?”

A chill runs up Derek’s spine, and it’d feel better to shift now and have his claws out, but he can’t, and now he particularly can’t, and _why hadn’t she told him about the Wild Hunt_?

Lydia walks right up to the queen and kisses her on the cheek, a familiarity that shows either nerves or having been here too many times. Derek just nods at her, because this may be her territory, but he’s a Hale, goddammit, and he won’t abase himself here. When Lydia stands back, she doesn’t rejoin Stiles and Derek, but she stands perpendicular to the queen, which means at least she’s not showing solidarity with them.

“It is good to meet you, Alpha Hale. I knew your mother, before she settled down.” The queen’s voice sounds like apples smell, and the synesthesia of this realm makes Derek’s canines itch.

He smiles, showing only a civilized number of teeth. “Thank you, your Majesty. We appreciate the peace between our people.”

“People,” someone says, just on the edge of Derek’s hearing. “Dogs are people now? His mother at least knew her place in the Hunt.”

Derek isn’t quite sure if he was meant to hear it - he wouldn’t if he were anything but an alpha. But it’s better, probably, to take everything as deliberate here, and he keeps his face deliberately impassive, though he knows that Stiles can pick up his tension through the pack bond.

“Please, go forth to the ball in continued peace,” the queen says, and gestures dismissively.

Derek nods - he will not bow to her - and backs away. Lydia, showing that she’s not completely taken in by glamour in close proximity, follows, grabbing Stiles by the elbow and towing him along. Derek says nothing to Lydia, because everything will be overheard here, and they’re not given privacy anyway: a pair of twins come up to them, tuxedoed but androgynous. They bow to the party collectively, all overfluid grace, then zero in on Stiles. “Will you dance with us, witch?”

Derek doesn’t make a move. He’d prepared for creepy fae hitting on Stiles. Other things are a surprise, but this isn’t.

Stiles says, “Uh, sure?”

They simultaneously put opposite hands on either side of Stiles’ face and coo at him and drag him away. It’s all very creepy and synchronous. Derek might be glaring a bit. It’s fine.

Lydia turns to him, snapped somehow back into her skin. “Drinks?”

“Please.” He can smell mead and apple wine, with the potent tang in his throat that means they’ll get anything drunk. He’d only had fairy wine a couple times in New York - it was easier to mix in certain strains of wolfsbane than to track down a fairy willing to do business - and he’s kind of looking forward to taking the edge off. Nothing more than that, though, not with the Hunt hanging over them and people to look out for.

Lydia gets them both glasses of apple wine as Derek tries and fails not to stare at Stiles dancing. Lydia hands him a glass at the same time as another Fae - this one in a dress - appears at his other side. Real apparition - they weren’t there at all before - but it’s still all coordinated and on-beat, their leaning into his personal space in perfect time with the music. “Will _you_ try to be rigfénnid? You’re too old for it, you know, and you’ve bled too much to be fianna - you’re the land’s as much as the land is yours. Aren’t dogs all about protecting what’s already theirs?”

Rage wafts up off Lydia like burned plastic. Derek subtly orients his body to her: it’ll read as solidarity. She’s not his, but no one else here needs to know that, needs to know the painful bruise of Peter still between them. Derek won’t show anything less than a united front, and the fae who think he’s an animal and still don’t remember that animals talk with their bodies won’t be able to understand why the three of them seem so impenetrable. “Have you noticed,” he says lightly, “anything you think would warrant a full cavalcade instead of our troubleshooting?”

Her smile’s a little feral around the edges, which is one of the things he likes best about her, “It’s been pretty quiet. Only thing so far this year you’ve needed the majority of the pack for was that camping trip.”

“Hardly seems worth formalizing anything for,” Derek says, and the Fae is purpling with rage at being talked around. They disappear from his side the same way they had arrived, and he smirks at Lydia.

The song ends, and the twins bring Stiles back. They’re petting him, fascinated. “Did you know he’d go to the tree if you asked?”

“If you even hinted.”

“Isn’t that a picture?” The twin on the left slides a hand inside Stiles’ jacket the next time the petting leads that low, and Derek reaches for Stiles.

Stiles takes his hand and lets himself be tugged away from the twins, smiling goofily. He leans against Derek’s side, far more louche than he should be from one dance and no drinks. Derek’s not sure exactly which tree they mean, whether a real one or something more figurative, but the way he figures none of it can be good, so he tucks Stiles close. Running a hand down Stiles’ arm just makes him lean in harder, which is more relaxed than Stiles should be here where everything is creepy and wrong. Derek scowls at everyone generally and the twins in particular.

Lydia has her head cocked to the side in a practiced gesture of distancing censure. “Our friend is our concern, and we know him and what he’d do just fine. Why do you think we need to be told?”

The twins laugh in synch. “There’s fun in the telling.”

“In stating what’s been left unsaid. Like -”

“You know some form of Hunt must hie after the wolf loose in the woods. And you -”

“Unblooded and untested -”

“- have more cause than most to run it down.”

Stiles starts to straighten, but Derek digs in his fingertips to keep him in place. He’d thought the wolf was just a wolf: there’d been nothing human in its howl. “We’ll look into it. On our own. We’re not on anyone’s _leash_.”

They laugh again. “Cry havoc and you none are leashed, but you’ll all still come when called.”

“We’re done with you,” Lydia says plainly, nerves and tension expertly concealed but still there. “I’m bored.”

They bow fluidly and leave. Lydia looks like she’d shake it off, but they’re still in public, and Derek feels the stares on his skin. He reaches out and hooks his free hand around her wrist. The haptic feedback’s for his comfort as much as hers, but presenting a united front - a grounded and physically united front in this place where things are discontiguous and intangible - is important. They’ll use it to make it through. And it’s not the worst party Derek’s ever been to: at least Peter’s not here.


	6. my head is an animal

They walk out of Faerie at dawn, worse for wear and feeling it. Derek shudders at being in the real air again, at feeling currents on his skin and not some carbonated monstrosity. Stiles is still out of it - though now because he’s had too much apple wine in addition to everything else. He’d been popular, as expected.

It looks like even Lydia is feeling the aftereffects, though, as she’s rubbing her arm like she’s trying to rid herself of something. “Home, sleep, debrief this afternoon,” she says.

“Are you good to drive?”

Lydia sticks her hand down the top of her dress, and Derek averts his eyes. “Allison’s coming to pick me up.”

Derek nods, and hesitates. He doesn’t want to leave her alone, exactly, because it’s still early enough to be abandoned and she’s conspicuous. But he also doesn’t want to see Allison particularly - she’s not a danger to his pack anymore, as far as he can tell, but there’s a well of blood and pain between them that it’s easier not to disturb.

Lydia keeps tapping on her phone, and flicks her free hand dismissively. “Go. I’ll be fine, and you need to take care of Stiles.”

Derek nods again, and guides Stiles back towards his apartment. Stiles paws at his shoulder in the elevator. “Hey, hey. They can’t make us do the thing, right?”

Derek runs his hand over the back of Stiles’ head and settles it loosely on the back of his neck, just to keep him in place. “They can’t make us, but they can make us wish we did.”

“I hate when all our options suck,” Stiles says.

“Me, too,” Derek says, and wishes it wasn’t a persistent state of being. He herds Stiles into the apartment, and can hear Isaac asleep in his room. “C’mon, you can sleep in the spare room.”

It used to be Peter’s room, but Derek’s cleaned it so thoroughly that no scent lingers. Now it just smells like pack. He deposits Stiles just inside the door. “You good?”

Stiles pats him on the chest. “I’m good. Just gonna - this hangover’s gonna <em>suck</em>.”

“Good night, Stiles,” Derek says, and retreats to his room to strip out of his tux. He can hear Stiles rustling around as he does, and is down to his briefs by the time he notices Stiles getting closer. He sighs and drapes his pants over the back of the chair. He’s too tired and tipsy to be a good person.

Stiles is wearing his undershirt and a pair of sleep pants when he pushes the door open. “Does becoming - or joining, whatever this would be - the Wild Hunt mean we’d be trading our souls for immortality?”

He seems to absorb Derek’s state of undress then, and blinks. Derek can feel the pooling warmth between them.

“No,” Derek says, and Stiles eyes flick guiltily back up. “There’s a lot of myth about the Wild Hunt, but it’s usually the young and supernatural who aren’t tied down going around and wreaking havoc or keeping order. It wouldn’t change anything about the pack except who we answer to.”

Stiles hunches into himself, looking a lot less confident than usual. “I don’t want to answer to them.”

“We won’t,” Derek promises, and presses comfort into Stiles’ skin with a hand on his bare arm. “Get some sleep. We need to talk to Lydia later.”

Stiles sways momentarily closer, gaze travelling back down Derek’s body like a caress. “Yeah, okay.” He licks his lips, seems on the verge of saying something, then sways back. “Right. Gonna grab some water. G’night.”

“Night, Stiles,” Derek says, and stays where he is while Stiles walks away. He lets out a breath that’s not quite steady, and crawls into bed.

 


	7. the birds they got help from below

Lydia buzzes in the early afternoon, when Derek’s just getting started on his second cup of coffee. He lets her into the building and goes to put on a shirt. Isaac’s long gone, somewhere across town with Erica and Boyd, but Stiles is still sleeping, so Derek knocks on the door on the way to his bedroom.

Stiles stumbles out about the time Derek opens the door, looking grey and worse for wear. “Coffee?”

Lydia lobs a bottle of Gatorade at him. He fumbles it against his chest longer than seems really plausible, but manages to corral the bottle eventually. “You’re amazing.”

There’s sincere gratitude in his voice, but not - things Derek isn’t listening for anyway, because Stiles is underage, and that matters. Stiles drinks half of it in one long chug, then helps himself to a mug of coffee and brings both into the living room.

“Okay,” Lydia says. “That went worse than I expected but better than it could have. Neither of you agreed to anything, right?”

“Nah,” Stiles says. “Wasn’t quite that drunk.”

“Is there actually a wolf in the woods?”

Derek looks away, towards the woods, even though he doesn’t have a view. “I thought it was a full wolf, but it won’t be, if they want to send us after it.”

Stiles looks at him, betrayed. “There are no wolves in California!”

Derek’s actually kind of surprised Stiles hasn’t been paying attention, and raises an eyebrow at him. “They came back last year.”

“As _fascinating_ as conservation is, how likely is it to be a real wolf?”

Derek resents the implication that he’s not a real wolf just because he’s also a man, though to be fair werewolves seem to be more arbitrary magic than either man or wolf.

Stiles snorts. “It’s Beacon Hills. We’ll be lucky if it’s not another alpha pack.”

“No,” Derek says. “It was alone.” An omega, then. One they should bring in - one he would have felt if he’d encountered it near his territory rather than just hearing it outside the bounds of Beacon Hills. He can feel a recurrence of an old sense of inadequacy and failure, but it makes him want to expand his territory and his senses this time rather than curl up in bed and die or run forever.

There’s a pause, and Lydia crosses her ankles. “It’s as much your business as it is mine, at this point. Are you going after it?”

Derek runs a hand over his face. “Yeah. At least to move it along.”

“If we do it too soon it looks like we’re jumping to do what they say,” Stiles says. “But the last omega ate that guy’s liver out of the ambulance.”

“We’ll go tonight,” Derek says. It’ll at least get it over with. Even if it looks like they’re doing what they’re told, they’re decisive about it. He rolls his shoulders, frustrated, and checks his phone. Still a couple hours before everyone else is done with school.

They keep rehashing parts of it - more Stiles and Lydia than Derek, because Derek felt what he felt and some of it, like the lingering wrongness of the air there, doesn’t translate well to words. Derek brings Stiles more coffee when he runs out, but otherwise just listens to them. He’s not stupid - smart, even, by some measures, with most of a degree from Columbia before the rest of his life fell apart - but he thinks steady and mostly linear, not like these two. It’s fun to watch the way they flit from one scenario or interpretation to the next. They start circling, though, winding themselves up with worst case scenarios. He leans forward and puts a hand on Stiles’ knee to stop them. “Will you come to the woods with us?”

Lydia shakes her head. “I’m not going near a feral werewolf if I don’t need to, and you don’t need me.”

Derek nods. “Do you want to watch Netflix while we wait for the others?”

“I’ve got homework,” Lydia says. “Stiles, text me when it’s done.”


	8. her dirty paws and furry coat

Stiles sits back against the couch. It’s satisfying that he doesn’t even think of leaving. They get through an episode of Fringe before class gets out, and then Stiles mass texts the rest of the pack. Derek can feel a spike of irritation from Scott, and wonders what the hell Stiles said, or if it’s just that Stiles is here with him.

“They don’t need to come until dark.” There’s no point in the pack being here earlier, since there’s not a lot to plan. Derek doesn’t want to actually turn them away, though: he loves being surrounded by his pack.

“Whatever,” says Stiles, still looking down at his phone. “They can come watch Netflix with us.”

Derek gets up, rests a hand on the back of Stiles’ neck as he walks behind him to the kitchen. “Want water?”

“Yeah.” There’s a thread of warm fondness coming from Stiles, but it fades into distraction as a new text comes in.

-

Isaac’s the first one back, because he doesn’t have to stop anywhere else. “I’m not getting rid of the body if we have to kill this omega. Shapeshifter guts ruined my favorite pair of jeans and I’m sick of losing clothes.”

“Don’t you have enough scarves that they breed on their own?”

“ _Pants_ , Stiles.”

Stiles rolls his eyes so hard his whole torso moves. “Whatever. Are we supposed to find another sad orphan with a backhoe?”

Derek raises an eyebrow at him. That’s pushing close to the edge, even for the way the two of them pretend to hate each other still.

One side of Stiles mouth twitches, like he’s trying not to say anything, and then he shifts his shoulders like he’s shrugging the whole thing off. Isaac is judging them absolutely, and Derek narrows his eyes at him. Isaac throws up his hands in overdramatic portrayal of defeat and goes to drop his stuff in his room.

Boyd and Erica come in together, Boyd gesturing Erica in ahead of him and her smiling instead of glaring like she would at anyone else. They both feel fizzily happy, and it’s good. He knows they all perceive the pack bond differently, because they’re different people as much as the fact that the rest of them aren’t born wolves, but he thinks they have to know that they’ve built a good thing here. It’ll be strong even when they go to university and only circle back home on breaks.

Scott comes in last, of course, smelling of Argent and feeling of misery. He probably stopped to talk to Allison again. Derek suppresses a sigh.

Stiles is the one who starts them off now that they’re together. “So. Obviously we survived the party, it was great and also creepy. We’re not under direct threat, but there’s an omega in the woods, so guess what we’re hunting down tonight?”

“We’re not killing him, though,” Scott says adamantly.

Derek can feel Stiles flash of impatience, but then Stiles steadies, and he nods. It should probably upset Derek that his second’s whole moral compass is external, but at least he knows what Stiles’ morals are comprised of because of it. “We’ll do what we need to,” Derek cuts in. As much as he likes Scott’s steady ideals, his pack needs to know that they come first, that they need to protect themselves no matter the cost.

The muscle at the corner of Scott’s jaw twitches, but he doesn’t say anything. Which is - pack should be more. He should be better at this: he’s almost done with a degree about how groups work, for fuck’s sake. Derek shrugs off the familiar frustration and stands up. “We should go now. It’ll be dark by the time we corner it.”

Derek and Stiles both drive, because there’s not quite enough room in either of their vehicles. It kind of eats at Derek that the most practical ways to transport everyone in one vehicle will make him look like either a hunter or a soccer mom. They get to the Preserve near the remains of his house, the oak still supersaturated green even as the setting sun washes everything in twilit gold and blue. It still hurts in complicated ways to look at it. “Fan out. Line of sight where you can, otherwise within hearing of each other at all times, and call out if you find a trail.”

Stiles breathes in - and it feels like it’s pulling from the pack bond rather than just air, so Derek watches him. He just grins, and his eyes burn a little brighter. “I should be able to see something even without the wolfy enhancements.”

Erica flies over and grabs his face, looking intently at his eyes. “That’s awesome. Low light vision or just better overall?”

Stiles bounces a little on the balls of his feet. “Both! Bet I’ll find something faster than you will.”

“Neither of you will find anything if you don’t get moving,” Isaac says, following Scott towards the west.

They move out, and it’s Boyd who finds a trail, circling close to the back of the house. Following it is a team effort, with Erica’s sense of smell and Derek’s eyesight and Stiles’ magic. They go deeper into the woods, and Derek remembers wandering back here when he was a kid, playing hide and seek with Laura and Cora. The smell out here is almost the same, almost like family. Which would confirm werewolf even if nothing else had. Derek picks up speed as the night gets darker and the trail gets fresher, because he doesn’t need more help picking it up. There’s something almost familiar about the scent, and of the omegas he knows, all of the ones he’s on friendly terms with would have stopped by to say hello. And the smell is wild, too, like the omega hasn’t been near people in ages, and part of him fears that Stiles and Allison and Lydia hadn’t been as thorough as they’d thought and it’s Peter out here needing to be killed again.

He hears a howl, and breaks into a sprint, because it’s something like a howl he remembers, and he can’t he can’t he can’t -

The moon high overhead cuts through the trees, still sparsely leafed in springtime. It catches on the wolf’s fur as she lies unkempt and chewing her feet on the grass. Her eyes flick to him, and her hackles rise, but she doesn’t move.

It feels like Derek’s strings have all been cut, and he sinks to his knees.

**“Cora.”**


	9. they were scared down in their holes

Boyd’s the first one to reach the clearing, and Cora reacts to him far more violently than Derek. She stops chewing on her feet to bare her teeth and skitter away, and Derek throws an arm out to keep Boyd behind him. “She’s -”

Derek has to stop and clear his throat. “She’s my sister.”

Erica stops behind Boyd, but she’s almost vibrating with the desire to go forward. When Isaac gets there, Cora starts up with a low, continuous growl. There’s nothing of human communication there, just threat and fear and instinct.

Derek can hear Jackson and Scott coming up from behind, and Stiles’ panting as he tries to catch up. He doesn’t know if he wants them there. “Cora,” he says, but she doesn’t put her teeth away.

“Woah,” Stiles says as he comes up, and Cora’s growl kicks up a notch.

“Please,” Derek says. It’s still a hard word for him to say, but this - God, all of this.

“Do we need to get a muzzle?”

“Shut the fuck up, Jackson,” Erica says.

“She’s scared,” Scott says softly, slipped thoroughly into his work mode. It sends a flare of resentment through Derek: his sister is not the same as a dog. He tamps it down, though, because Deaton had called him back from the dead with a dog whistle, and it doesn’t matter what he thinks of any methods as long as they work, as long as they keep Cora there and maybe bundle her back to town, back to the apartment and a bath and her human skin.

“We need to take her home,” Derek says. “Cora, you need to come home.”

Stiles demands, “Can’t you do some kind of alpha thing at her?”

“She’s not his pack,” Scott says, still calm. “She’s going to spook if we come at her.”

“We could tranq her,” Isaac suggests.

Derek tunes them out as much as he can, focusing on Cora. She’s still growling, but it seems more obligatory than anything else. He stretches one of his hands towards her, and she focuses in on him. There’s still nothing of his sister in her eyes, but they’re brighter, which is something, the magic that’s part of her nature responding to all of theirs. He moves his head just a little to the side, and she follows. Good. “Go,” he says. “Do what you need to.” He’s fully aware that someone’s said ‘Argent,’ but this is his sister.

Scott and Isaac leave. As they do, Cora’s snarl gets less emphatic.

Boyd, with his usual insight, asks, “How far should we back off?”

“Stay in earshot,” Stiles says. Stiles stays, of course, as everyone else fades away. He puts a hand on Derek’s shoulder.

Cora stops growling, and her hackles drop a little. She hunkers closer to the ground. She doesn’t relax, though, and is still eyeing them warily.

They stay there at an impasse for what feels like forever as the night darkens. The only high point is that she doesn’t run. He feels Scott and Isaac coming back towards them long before he can pick them up on any other senses, but when he does, there are three instead of two. He tenses. “They brought one of them.”

Stiles pauses. “Probably Allison. She’s a good shot, so at least it’ll be clean.”

“Can’t -” He wants Stiles to do it. Wants it to be pack, someone he knows won’t try to hurt her. But Allison has her code to follow now, at least, and he wants some kind of lasting peace with the Argents. “Fine.”

Stiles’ hand tightens reassuringly on Derek’s shoulder. “She’ll probably have night vision goggles, too, so it’ll be fast.”

It’s another five minutes until Allison comes up to them alone - someone must have filled them in and held back Scott and Isaac. She stops well back. “It’s ketamine, diazepam, and kanima venom,” she says softly. “You can check, if you want to. It should knock her out and keep her down for about an hour.”

“No, I -” He can’t say he trusts her, he doesn’t, it’s ridiculously out of the realm of possibility. “Please just do it.”

“Okay,” she says. There’s a pause, and mechanical sounds, and a whoosh of air that isn’t like the gunshots he’s used to.

Cora whines, and tries to turn to look at her side in more detail, and then whimpers, and then drops. Derek heaves out a breath, and only keeps himself from racing towards her because he can hear her heartbeat. “Thank you.”

“Yeah,” Allison says. She stays, like she has something more to say, and they’re frozen in a tableau until Stiles takes his hand off Derek to clap his hands together.

“Right! Let’s move her.”

Derek stumbles to his feet and scoops up Cora. She’s warm, and much lighter than she should be. He ducks his face into her fur and takes a deep breath - quick, so the humans shouldn’t notice, but it’s still grounding, and reassures him that it is indeed Cora. When he turns around, Allison’s shouldered her gun and is ostentatiously unarmed. She looks at him steadily, even though he knows she won’t see very well in the dark with her goggles around her neck.

“Let’s go.”

They meet up with the rest of the pack and walk back to the cars in relative silence: it seems like everyone’s picked up that he doesn’t want to say anything in front of an Argent, except Scott who’s mostly just trying not to get caught watching her. Allison’s car is with the Jeep and the Camaro, making an odd trio.

The group is made odder - and worse, infinitely worse - when an Argent SUV pulls up, blocking them in. A pair of hunters Derek doesn’t recognize slide out, guns already in hand. “Allison, does your dad know you’re out playing with dogs?”


	10. the bees had declared a war

Stiles inches away from Derek, and Derek doesn’t blame him at all. Derek is fully aware that if shooting starts, they’re going to shoot Derek first. Allison takes a couple steps forward as the rest of the pack fans out. “I was doing a favor for a friend,” Allison says, dead calm.

“You’re friends with these animals?” One of the hunters snorts. “Argents _put down_ rabid dogs, they don’t do them favors.”

“As the only Argent here,” Allison says, “I think I would know best.” Her back is very straight, and she’s come to a stop directly between Derek and the guns. Her hands are at her sides, and he notices, finally, the slight bumps on the back of her shirt. Knives, then, but close weapons are no match for guns: it’s why hunters use them in the first place.

Stiles is easing open the passenger door of the Jeep, and it makes Derek clutch Cora tighter, because he can’t grab Stiles, and every creak of hinge is painful.

“You think you’d still get to carry the name if your daddy knew you were here?”

“I’m the head of the family,” Allison says, voice subzero and perfectly level. “As such, you work for me. Or you did - feel free to leave if you don’t like the way I do things.”

The one who’s been talking spits on the ground. “I think we might. Answering to a dog-fucking teenager’s never been in the game plan.”

“We should just put them all down,” says the other one. They bring their guns to bear starting at opposite ends of the semicircle of pack, like this is something they’ve done before, like they have an established pattern and rhythm for slaughter.

The air goes more still, until the release of the safety on Stiles’ gun is as loud as a shot. He’s still standing most of the way behind the Jeep, but he’s got his gun up and sighted on the talker. “I think you should just leave, instead.”

The talker swings his gun towards Stiles, and a shot rings out.

Derek could swear his heart stops at the sudden bloom of blood on the air, but it’s - the talker is leaning on the side of his SUV, bleeding from the knee.

“You little fuck,” starts the other one, but Allison’s brought her gun up and the pack have their claws out.

“Before you start getting stupid ideas,” Stiles says, “I’m the Sheriff’s son, and I have a whole pack of witnesses who’d swear up and down that I was in fear for my life and defending myself.”

“And whether or not you decide to go to law enforcement,” Allison adds, “I’m having you blacklisted for threatening a human teenager.”

“You should probably go get that looked at,” says Jackson. “You’re making a mess.”

The talker snarls as well as humans ever can, and levers himself back into the SUV, favoring his bleeding leg. “I’m telling everyone how low the Argents have fallen.”

Allison laughs, and it probably sounds careless to human hearing despite the strain all through it. “Who do you think they’ll believe? I’m an Argent, after all.”

The SUV slams shut like it’s the only response they can think of, and they roar away.

Everyone relaxes. Allison lets out a shuddering breath and steps aside so that she can keep everyone in her peripheral vision again. Stiles starts unloading his gun, and his hands shake. Derek carries Cora to the Camaro and stands pointedly next to the rear passenger door. Boyd opens it, and he lays her on the seat. She doesn’t move, doesn’t even twitch, and he adjusts her head so it’s in a less awkward position before he straightens.

Scott’s taken Stiles’ keys, and Derek nods at him for it. Stiles shouldn’t drive while his adrenaline is crashing. He surveys the rest of his pack, and they’re okay - still keyed up, but they’re physically fine, and the fear is fading. “Boyd, Isaac, go with Scott and Stiles. We’ll take her back” - he hesitates, because the loft is more secure, but the whole building’s still under construction - “to the apartment.”

They all get into their vehicles except for Allison, standing there looking increasingly lost in the dark. He doesn’t want to say it, but he has to. “Thanks.”

The Jeep rumbles on, and she’s caught halfway between the dark and the light. She hesitates. “You’re welcome,” she says, and turns abruptly to her car, popping the trunk.

Derek gets in the Camaro and starts back towards Beacon Hills and the home he’s started to build there.


	11. and that's how the story goes

Derek parks in his spot and Erica gets out. “I’m going to go call the elevator. Keys?”

Derek passes her his keycard and maneuvers around Jackson to get Cora out. She’s warm, at least, though she’s still upsettingly unmoving. He concentrates on her heart as they go in - getting in the elevator immediately and not standing around where the other tenants can ask why he’s carrying a wolf.

Erica gets the door to the apartment, too, and it means that Derek can carry her straight in and put her on the couch. Jackson starts fussing, an instinct he’s not repressing as much these days. He drapes the blanket over the back of the couch before he seems to come back to himself and scowls down at Cora. “What are you even going to do with her?”

Erica, perched in the armchair and just watching, echoes him. “Yeah. Isn’t she kind of feral?”

“I think she’s been out there this whole time. I don’t know how, though. You can go - it’ll be easier on her with fewer people around.”

Erica pops up. “Sure. Text if you need anything.”

The elevator dings open on their floor, and Erica and Jackson both tense, because they don’t feel the pack bonds quite so intensely as Derek and it takes them a moment to recognize Isaac and Stiles.

Erica lets them in and herself and Jackson out. Derek sits down next to Cora and pets the fur around her face. It’s matted, but not badly: she’s been taking some care of herself out there. Stiles locks the door behind Jackson and flops into a chair. “So,” he starts, bright and sharp as shattered glass, “guess who was waiting at my house?”

Derek’s hand stills, and his fingers twitch and curl deeper into Cora’s fur. “Who?”

“One of the assholes from the party. They wanted to tell us we’d done well.”

Isaac leans angrily against the wall. “I don’t want to be someone’s tool.”

“We’re not,” Derek reassures him. “We won’t be. What did you tell him?”

Stiles takes a deep breath and looks down at his hands. He flexes his right hand, the one that still smells like gunpowder. “I told him the Hunt answers to no one.” A beat of silence follows, and Stiles snaps his head up. “That’s what we did, that’s a thing we can be in relation to them and not have them have any control over it, right?

Derek considers - looks down at Cora and thinks about tricksters who like a good story - and then nods. The answer’s not ideal, but he can’t imagine how his ideal of never dealing with them again would come to pass. The peace with Faerie is good for the pack’s survival, and a role in their worldview that preserves their independence and equal standing, paired with Lydia’s blood tie and friendship with Stiles, puts them in a position that might even edge out to positive. “It works.”

Stiles slumps back in the chair like all his strings have been cut, and Isaac jerks forward with a quick jolt of worry. Isaac tends to forget how Stiles falls apart when there’s nothing else to do, because he’s usually somewhere else, so Derek shakes his head minutely. Stiles doesn’t need to be fussed over right now - or, well, he needs it, but won’t appreciate it. “Isaac, would you mind going to get pizza? I don’t want to order delivery in case she wakes up.”

Isaac looks relieved, and Derek passes him the keys to the Camaro. It’s getting easier to relinquish at least that much control. Stiles stays where he is while Isaac leaves, and Derek just watches him. “There’s ibuprofen under the sink if you want something for the headache.”

Stiles tilts his head back against the chair and closes his eyes. “I’ve never shot someone before.”

“I know,” Derek says. He itches to reach out, but it feels like it would be a step too far, so he just scritches behind Cora’s ear. But Stiles is in pain, and still not moving, so Derek gets up to get him ibuprofen and a glass of water. When he comes back, Stiles is in the same position, but opens his whiskey eyes to look up at him.

“I would again,” he says quietly.

The air between them feels close and charged even though Derek’s just standing there with his hands full. “I know that, too,” Derek says, just as quiet. He wonders, sometimes, just how much Stiles can feel through the pack link. It’s more than the betas, closer to what he feels as alpha, but he doesn’t know if it’s because of Stiles’ magic or - other reasons. “We do what we have to, right?”

Stiles stares at him, and there’s a careful bloom of something between them. “Can I kiss you?”

Derek leans down and presses his mouth to Stiles’. It’s not much of a kiss, as these things go, with the angles all wrong and Stiles slightly acrid with lingering adrenaline sweat. But his mouth is soft and warm, and Stiles’ tiny hitch of breath and sigh are like secrets Derek can tuck away.

On the couch, Cora’s breathing changes, so Derek straightens. Stiles looks slightly dazed, but he takes them without complaint when Derek hands over the water and painkillers he’s been holding.

Cora blinks dazedly, and Derek puts his hand on the back of her neck. The contact might help ground her and bring her back to herself. She lets out a low, distressed whine. “Cora,” he says, just breathes really, trying to soothe and remind all in one.

She looks at him, straight in the eyes finally, and holds eye contact the way she wouldn’t if she were completely gone. “Come on,” he says. A shiver goes through her fur.

Derek lets his eyes bleed red, and hers light up gold in response. The shiver turns to a shudder, and her fur recedes, leaving her naked and dirty. But it’s his sister, finally his sister, his sister he’d thought was dead.

“Derek?” she asks wonderingly, voice rough with disuse. He pulls her in by the neck for a hug, just wraps his arms around her and holds. They hadn’t been close as kids, but now she’s the only one left.

The pack bond wells up like it had always been there, buried under tragedy and ash, and if he sobs into her shoulder once there’s no one here who’d tell. Cora puts her arms around him slowly, like she’s not sure how either human limbs or hugs work.

“Cora,” Stiles breaks in. “Do you want a shower?”

Derek tightens his arms convulsively, because he doesn’t want to let her out of his sight, but Cora cranes away from him to look at Stiles. “Hot water?”

“Hot as you want. Bonus: soap.”

She pushes away from Derek, and he reluctantly lets her go, then helps her to stand. He knows how hard it is to acclimate to different movements after only a few hours on four legs. He can’t imagine years. He steadies her to the wall, but then she shakes him off. He’d worry about showing her the bathroom, but it smells like water and shampoo and she can find it just fine.

Cora moves like she’s not quite sure how her knees work, but she makes it, and closes the door. Derek watches the door and listens until the water turns on. Part of him is hurt that she’d rather go right there than even meet the other person who helped bring her in, but he remembers she’s been alone for years, and he can’t expect her to be as open as she was. He makes himself turn around, and Stiles is smiling at him. He smiles back, almost involuntarily, because things may still be complicated, but they have time.

They have a pack, and each other, and time.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much to Kelly for the beta. <3
> 
> It has been a long ride, but this is the end of the main arc of Get Sharp. There is one more story coming, set about five years from now.


End file.
